What I think is apparent now is that everyone expected Microsoft to build a competitor to the iPad, then we saw a lot of fervent activity, and throughout we assumed that building an iPad was exactly what they were doing. Now that I hold the Surface in my hands, I'm not sure that's what they were doing at all.

There's now an additional duality highlighted with Surface. We can now see decisions that the market forced Microsoft to make with its incessant demands to keep throwing cash at Apple in exchange for iPads. Just looking at how Surface operates, everything that we see in the reimagined Windows -- the UX, the Start menu, Windows Store apps, the Metro design aesthetic, all of this is secondary to the primary goal of getting Office to run on an ARM-based tablet. It's "Office" first, "compete with iPad" second.

The Office side of this is perfect. Everything else that will make Windows RT and Surface attractive in the consumer and business markets is playing catch-up. You should only invest in Surface is your an ardent early adopter and are aware that the experience of using this thing is, as I mentioned, like using an 18-month old Android tablet.

For me, the Surface is a "Wordbook", a new device form-factor for running Word in ultra-portable, cloud-connected mode that also happens to be one degree away from a market ready post-PC tablet

Translation: Surface (and other RT Tablets) are about keeping iPad out of the corporate market not about going after the consumer media pad market. (Not yet.)

After 2 days of comparison:
Most of the times, I'll stick to the touch cover.

Very often, I'm using the Surface RT as a "normal" tablet.
Then I fold the covers back.
Both covers work flawlessly.
If you lay the tablet flat on a table and the cover is in front, typing works fine.
If you fold the cover back, more than 180° angle, the keys are blocked.
Meaning: When folded back, you can't by accident hit any keys.
Absolutely fine, just as intended.
BUT: I find it a bit awkward, having the tips of my fingers rest on the keys. You still can press them and it just feels a bit "strange".
On the touch keyboard, this doesn't matter, as you don't actually press the keys but kind of "hover" over them.

So: When traveling and/or only doing "light typing", I'll stick to the touch cover.
But I'll take the type cover with me all the time, in the very same sleeve.
When switching to "heavy typing", I can exchange the covers then.

I frequent a website called "Make use of" and on their site they have free cheat sheets you can print out on various topics. One such cheat sheet is a Windows 8 "Touch and Mouse Gestures."
Worth looking into so you can get the most out of the UI.
Ralph

I frequent a website called "Make use of" and on their site they have free cheat sheets you can print out on various topics. One such cheat sheet is a Windows 8 "Touch and Mouse Gestures."
Worth looking into so you can get the most out of the UI.
Ralph

Only 128standard and so expensive to go to 256 which is still a small drive these days.

Depends on what you're doing with it. If you buy it for web browsing, email and word processing, 128GB should be plenty. If you want to install a few modern games at 20GB apiece, or put your entire movie and music collection on the disk, you'll run out fast.

Played with a Surface for about 10 minutes this weekend. The lack of apps was the most glaring deficit, but I also found the thin keyboard with no key travel was unwieldy to type on. I didn't get a chance to use the thicker cover. Hardware seemed fairly nice otherwise. However, the dual metro/desktop OS is completely incomprehensible to me. You haven't lived until you've experienced the special hell of trying to use Excel with a touchscreen.

Played with a Surface for about 10 minutes this weekend. The lack of apps was the most glaring deficit, but I also found the thin keyboard with no key travel was unwieldy to type on. I didn't get a chance to use the thicker cover. Hardware seemed fairly nice otherwise. However, the dual metro/desktop OS is completely incomprehensible to me. You haven't lived until you've experienced the special hell of trying to use Excel with a touchscreen.

Wow, Mr Apple made it through 10 minutes on a non-iDevice. The Surface must be really special, now I know I will have to get one!

Played with a Surface for about 10 minutes this weekend. The lack of apps was the most glaring deficit, but I also found the thin keyboard with no key travel was unwieldy to type on. I didn't get a chance to use the thicker cover. Hardware seemed fairly nice otherwise. However, the dual metro/desktop OS is completely incomprehensible to me. You haven't lived until you've experienced the special hell of trying to use Excel with a touchscreen.

I'm curious how a ten minute play can provide anybody with the conclusion that the "lack of apps was the most glaring deficit"?

I'm curious how a ten minute play can provide anybody with the conclusion that the "lack of apps was the most glaring deficit"?

Unfortunately, 10 minutes is more than plenty to gather the lack of apps.
There are ca. 10 categories.
In each category you find ca. 100 to 400 apps.
You easily can scroll through those 100 to 400 apps in a minute or so.
The tiles are very informative and neatly arranged. But the downside to this is, you can scroll through the apps that fast...

Played with a Surface for about 10 minutes this weekend. The lack of apps was the most glaring deficit, but I also found the thin keyboard with no key travel was unwieldy to type on. I didn't get a chance to use the thicker cover. Hardware seemed fairly nice otherwise. However, the dual metro/desktop OS is completely incomprehensible to me. You haven't lived until you've experienced the special hell of trying to use Excel with a touchscreen.

On one hand I agree: The experience is somewhat inconsistent. On one side, you have the tiles. Great design and quite an innovation. On the other side, the office suite falls back to the desktop. Still better than what I've seen on iOS or on Android.
But: There's a version of OneNote within the office suite. And there's another, Windows 8 specific, version of OneNote. I very much prefer the Windows 8 style. And it perfectly shows, what can be done...

Unfortunately, 10 minutes is more than plenty to gather the lack of apps.
There are ca. 10 categories.
In each category you find ca. 100 to 400 apps.
You easily can scroll through those 100 to 400 apps in a minute or so.
The tiles are very informative and neatly arranged. But the downside to this is, you can scroll through the apps that fast...

How many apps do you need?
Lets pass on the games. I don't do games except on rare occasion, I might look at something someone is pressing into my hand.

Lets look at one thing. WiFi apps. I have looked at most of the Android Apps for WiFi and tried to use them. I even tried to take a short cut and look at the paid ones trying to find one really good one that would just hook me up with the public WiFi spots without me asking for a password or something.

I did like the 2 or 3 that showed me where public wifi spots were relative to my position but the old android settings app did just as well except for that characteristic. My GPS units will give me better locations of restaurants etc, that I can be fairly certain will have a wifi spot.

My point is that 100 good apps OR FEWER should suffice except for the games.
The other 100 thousand or more is just redundant!